posted October 15, 200909:08 PM
The vaccine got the same tests as other flu vaccines, Daruma. Is there a reason, other than general mistrust, that you call it questionable?

BTW, I suspect you know this, but "global pandemic" is an accurate description, not alarmism. I think it HAS been over-hyped, by the media (the mainstream media have a clear sensationalist bias), but other than that all I've seen is a pretty strong effort by disease control agencies to ensure that we're as prepared as possible, and a general sense of relief that things aren't as bad as initially feared.

posted October 15, 200909:45 PM
Unless I'm misremembering, the term "pandemic" applies when a new infectious disease or strain of disease that can result in serious illness emerges and quickly spreads across a very wide human population. I may not have that exactly right (didn't bother accessing WHO or CDC) but I'm quite certain that rate and spread of infection are the issues, not the number of fatalities (though obviously pandemics of fatal diseases are much more destructive.)

Influenza (the real thing, not what most of us mean when we say we have the flu, which is usually a very bad cold and/or a stomach bug) is a dangerous disease for people with underlying conditions or who are infirm, and also has a propensity to mutate into more dangerous forms. It is also highly contagious, with a dangerous pre-symptom period of transmissibility (IIRC most viral illnesses are more trasmissible after symptoms appear, which provides an advantage inasmuch as you can avoid visibly sick people). One of the reasons for promoting vaccination is the more people you have walking around incubating the virus in their warm little cells, the greater the probability that a new, more virulent strain will emerge.

While I respect the rights of people to make their own decisions regarding what they ingest into their own bodies, I can respect persons without feeling a need to respect every decision they make simply because it is their right to make those decisions. I would hope that when considering this issue everyone a) remembers that they are almost unavoidably members of a larger community and b) endeavors to make such decisions from an informed place, rather than one of emotional reaction. I also think that the way to become informed is to examine the scientific data and discourse (which, contrary to public opinion, is not monolithic), the historical and statistical record, and the recommendation of one's own (presumably trusted) physician, who is at the very least somewhat conversant with the likely effects of any medical intervention on your particular person. I do not consider pharmaceutical firms, people with political agendas, or the cousin of a guy my neighbor works with to be sound sources of decision-informing data.
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posted October 15, 200911:04 PM
In this case I thought "global pandemic" might be an expression coined by Daruma28, as it seemed any pandemic would be global by definition. But the WHO English language website defines a global pandemic to mean it sees little chance that any part of the world will escape the effects of the outbreak, not to mean the disease has as yet spread to the entire world or ever will do so. However the underlying reality is that the organization describes the geographical spread of a disease outbreak using a numerical scale,

quote:Phase 5 is characterized by human-to-human spread of the virus into least two countries in one WHO region. While most countries will not be affected at this stage, the declaration of Phase 5 is a strong signal that a pandemic is imminent and that the time to finalize the organization, communication, and implementation of the planned mitigation measures is short.

Phase 6, the pandemic phase, is characterized by community level outbreaks in at least one other country in a different WHO region in addition to the criteria defined in Phase 5. Designation of this phase will indicate that a global pandemic is under way.

So much of the suspicion about these definitions seems directed at the WHO as an international organization, which faces the reality that most people in the world do not know English, most of the government officials it attempts to advise know English at best as a second language, and even its employees may not be fluent in English. So it describes the geographical spread of a disease using numbers, and "global pandemic" is merely a clumsy English expression it uses sometimes in trying to make what is happening clear to those who speak English.

As Daruma28 has also pointed out in the past, it seems from the WHO's definition that a global pandemic could be declared in the case of a disease which is extremely widespread but poses no danger to anyone. That possibility seems to be negated by the purpose of the WHO, which exists to inform governments about disease and to recommend what actions to take. Unless a disease threatened people, the WHO would not assign its extent a number at all, but might merely allay public anxiety by announcing it seemed widespread but harmless.

At the moment, as MattP says, H1N1 seems the only type-A in the wild. There is no excuse for panic, but this strain seems to be killing four or five times as many people as do the strains which spread every winter. Furthermore a significant number of those who become severely ill or die are youthful and middle-aged people in good health who in most years would be in little danger from the usual annual outbreak of flu. Their risk remains small, and it is unknown how much the vaccines available will help, but people have a right to be concerned.

Otherwise what is reported by MattP may represent bureaucratic confusion in doling out limited supplies of a vaccine. Parents caring for children known to have this strain of flu obviously face increased risk of contracting the disease, and they should have priority for receiving the vaccine, unless authorities make a reasoned decision that their risk is already so high giving the vaccine would be useless. But in that case there seems little point in giving the vaccine to the other children in the family either, so I think that policy simply has not been thought through. And with the information available at present the justification for any policy adopted might be little better than tossing a coin.

quote:Otherwise what is reported by MattP may represent bureaucratic confusion in doling out limited supplies of a vaccine. Parents caring for children known to have this strain of flu obviously face increased risk of contracting the disease, and they should have priority for receiving the vaccine, unless authorities make a reasoned decision that their risk is already so high giving the vaccine would be useless. But in that case there seems little point in giving the vaccine to the other children in the family either, so I think that policy simply has not been thought through. And with the information available at present the justification for any policy adopted might be little better than tossing a coin.

For what it's worth, the other children were given the vaccine (and us parents denied it) prior to the results of the test. We were already away from the office when we heard that he was positive for type-A. Perhaps things would have been a little different if the diagnosis had come first, and perhaps they should have taken that potential diagnosis into account before administering the other vaccines. Then again, perhaps they did and the process is just opaque to me.
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posted October 17, 200902:33 AM
He's had an intermittent fever, as high as 104, but we treat it with ibuprofen and then back to normal. It's been several hours since the last time it spiked and he's sleeping well at the moment with good breathing and only a little bit of coughing. Hopefully he's about done with this.

Also mom and I visited the health department for H1N1 shots this morning. We've already been exposed of course but my wife is taking an immunosuppresent drug for crohn's disease which makes her more susceptible to infection, so even if it's only got a slight chance it'll help then we figure it's worth it.
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posted October 17, 200901:58 PM
Well, the medical establishment really screwed me. My wife was in her doctor's office yesterday and requested a flu shot. I suddenly turned into a patient when, before I knew what was happening, the nurse was injecting me with vaccine. No consent, I am not a patient of the doctor in that office, they just jabbed away.

posted October 17, 200902:15 PM
That's bizarre and outrageous. When we went to the health department we each had to fill out a lengthy questionnaire which included a big check box for "I am requesting an H1N1 vaccine today."

Our doctor's office was a lot less formal, but they still required each individual, including the children, to take the proactive step of standing up and stepping forward to receive their vaccination and before they started they did a sort of fast-food drive-up window recap of our order "OK, seasonal mist for mom and dad, h1n1 mist for everyone else except Benjamin. And which one is Benjamin?"
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posted October 17, 200904:49 PM
I think kenmeer is right. I think that would be grounds for malpractice. When I took my kids in to get their seasonal flu shots I had to sign a form for each one of them and when the nurses came in to give them the vaccine they verified that they were all getting the flu shot. I can't believe that your wifes nurse would do that!
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posted October 17, 200908:09 PM
What The Drake reports is completely out of line. Not only did the nurse fail to get consent, but she put his life in danger by giving him the shot without checking for sensitivities. If that had happened to me, I would have promptly phoned the police and reported it as a case of criminal assault. Perhaps the police would have been reluctant to investigate, but they probably would have made an exception if I said I was angry enough to kill someone, and might get carried away and do so if they failed to investigate. And police response to a criminal complaint would in turn have been a great help when I got in touch with a lawyer, and announced I was intending to sue the doctor and his nurse for their obvious malpractice. Not that I would try for heavy damages for an honest mistake, but they should not be allowed to get away with laughing off actions which were in fact criminal.

Even now they would probably stop laughing if someone gets in touch with an attorney and has him write them a letter threatening legal action. I doubt they would laugh off a formal complaint to the state medical association either. Of course no one has any obligation to do this sort of thing, and The Drake may not think it worthwhile to mess up his wife's relationship with her doctor, but what took place was both grossly negligent and possibly a crime.

This post was deleted and resubmitted because I turned out to be logged in as OrneryMod.
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posted October 19, 200902:37 AM
I hadn't even thought about the lack of a medical history or any potential complicating factors (like an immune deficiency or allergy). Thinking about that makes me more upset.

You're right to think that I won't make a fuss because my wife has a good relationship with her doctor, and the fact that the doc wasn't present for that whole scenario. My wife was shocked and very sorry that it happened while I was there to support her.

Isn't this very much like legally forcing people/children to be immunized, though? That's why I get so adamant about these issues. More than a little bizarre that such a thing would happen, as I thought those debates were largely abstract rather than applying directly to my person.
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quote:#1) Where are the randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled studies proving flu vaccines are both safe and effective?Answer: There aren't any.

#2) Where, then, is the so-called "science" backing the idea that flu vaccines work at all?Answer: Other than "cohort studies," there isn't any. And the cohort studies have been thoroughly debunked. Scientifically speaking, there isn't a scrap of honest evidence showing flu vaccines work at all.

#3) How can methyl mercury (Thimerosal, a preservative used in flu vaccines) be safe for injecting into the human body when mercury is an extremely toxic heavy metal?Answer: It isn't safe at all. Methyl mercury is a poison. Along with vaccine adjuvants, it explains why so many people suffer autism or other debilitating neurological side effects after being vaccinated.

#4) Why do reports keep surfacing of children and teens suffering debilitating neurological disorders, brain swelling, seizures and even death following flu vaccines or HPV vaccines?Answer: Because vaccines are dangerous. The vaccine industry routinely dismisses all such accounts -- no matter how many are reported -- as "coincidence."

#5) Why don't doctors recommend vitamin D for flu protection, especially when vitamin D activates the immune response far better than a vaccine? Answer: Because vitamin D can't be patented and sold as "medicine." You can make it yourself. If you want more vitamin D, you don't even need a doctor, and doctors tend not to recommend things that put them out of business.

#6) If human beings need flu vaccines to survive, then how did humans survive through all of Earth's history?Answer: Human genetic code is already wired to automatically defend you against invading microorganisms (as long as you have vitamin D).

#7) If the flu vaccine offers protection against the flu, then why are the people who often catch the flu the very same people who were vaccinated against it?Answer: Because those most vulnerable to influenza infections are the very same people who have a poor adaptive response to the vaccines and don't build antibodies. In other words flu vaccines only "work" on people who don't need them. (And even building antibodies doesn't equate to real-world protection from the flu, by the way.)

#8) If the flu vaccine really works, then why was there no huge increase in flu death rates in 2004, the year when flu vaccines were in short supply and vaccination rates dropped by 40%? Answer: There was no change in the death rate. You could drop vaccination rates to zero percent and you'd still see no change in the number of people dying from the flu. That's because flu vaccines simply don't work.

#9) How can flu vaccines reduce mortality by 50% (as is claimed) when only about 10% of winter deaths are related to the flu in the first place?They can't. The 50% statistic is an example of quack medical marketing. If I have a room full of 100 people, then I take the 50 healthiest people and hand them a candy bar, I can't then scientifically claim that "candy bars make people healthy." That's essentially the same logic behind the "50% reduction in mortality" claim of flu vaccines.

#10) If flu vaccines work so well, then why are drug makers and health authorities so reluctant to subject them to scientific scrutiny with randomized, placebo-controlled studies?Answer: Although they claim such studies would be "unethical," what's far more unethical is to keep injecting hundreds of millions of people every year with useless, harmful vaccines that aren't backed by a shred of honest evidence.

posted October 19, 200911:58 AM
Thankfully, the NY Times is providing a lesson plan and questionnaire for elementary-aged school kids and the teachers to use. Glad they are here to assist us in dealing with all that nasty propaganda out there.NYT Learning NetworkQuestionnaire

quote:Isn't this very much like legally forcing people/children to be immunized, though?

I don't think that we legally force people/children to be immunized.I readily admit that I could be wrong about that, of course.But I have never been forced to accept a vaccine, and as far as I know parents can decline vaccines on behalf of their children.

There might be some circumstances when being unvaccinated limits some of your options as far as what groups of people you are allowed to associate with, but that's all part of free choice. You can choose to let your baby be a potential disease vector, but you can't require that the rest of us let our babies play with him. You can decline the measles booster, but a school doesn't have to let you attend if they deem you a threat to the public health.

Anyways, are there actual laws that require a person to accept vaccines against her will?

Colin:Do you think you could stop spreading dangerous misinformation?

quote:

#6) If human beings need flu vaccines to survive, then how did humans survive through all of Earth's history?Answer: Human genetic code is already wired to automatically defend you against invading microorganisms (as long as you have vitamin D).

Seriously, dude? Genetic code is wired to automatically defend you against invading microorganisms? Either explain to the rest of us how that works, or stop spreading lies about things you don't understand.

And this one:

quote:Methyl mercury is a poison. Along with vaccine adjuvants, it explains why so many people suffer autism or other debilitating neurological side effects after being vaccinated.

Let's start with "correlation is not the same as causation" and move right along to "correlation hasn't even been established in this case."This stuff is a load of crap, and people spreading it around as though it were fact does NOT increase the sum total of human knowledge and understanding about the subject.

Asking questions is fine, but not when you've already made up the answer.

(As an aside, I rarely get the flu vaccine because I rarely get the flu, but remember that nobody is making you get it, either. Unless you're Drake and someone is violating you, in which case you should take legal action. And that the influenza vaccine is not indicated for all people does not equate to all vaccines being bad for everyone, or even to the flu vaccine being bad for everyone.)
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quote:Seriously, dude? Genetic code is wired to automatically defend you against invading microorganisms? Either explain to the rest of us how that works, or stop spreading lies about things you don't understand.

I assume you mean about how vitamin D is supposed to make our immune system work, Opsanus, since we all understand that humans have a pretty good immune system.

Of course, the original question is still very stupid, since what often happened in the past was that simply a lot of people, but not all, died. It is similar to asking why the Black Death was such a big deal, since it didn't kill off all of Europe. Posts: 8681 | Registered: Dec 2000
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posted October 19, 200906:56 PM
Well, Opie-T, the word 'microorganism' itself *wants* to embrace something that uses living bodies as a host to make copies of itself. Yes, I know the biological community can't decide whether viruses are 'alive' or not, and I sympathize with their dilemma regarding that distinction. But while organism means "capacity for response to stimuli, reproduction, growth and development, and maintenance of homeostasis as a stable whole" (bless you wiki), I say we look at a virus in terms of its entire life cycle and environment, not as it's teeny tiny singular self. In that context, it very much is an organism, albeit only in context of a suitable host, outside of which it is but a seed.

One could look at us a vast colony of microorganisms, which indeed we are, but instead we look at the holistic function that colony performs: a human being.

Likewise, a virus can be seen as the holistic function it performs, which doing so renders it a part, sometimes welcome, sometimes not, of a larger organism.

I'm not disagreeing but rather qualifying the line where the distinction between living microorganism/not living microorganism is made in the case of viruses.

They don't fit the full definition of a bioorganism but in so doing they challenge that definition, yes?
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posted October 19, 200907:48 PM
New tech can create new moral situations.

For example, when vaccines are made that can prevent a reliably estimated x # of lives, and that # is sufficiently large to concern the general populace, then not taking that vaccine becomes viewed by a great many people as a form of murder.

The underlying effect of new tech is to allow ever grater #s of people to live. The more people there are, the less personal liberty we have.
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posted October 19, 200909:40 PM
Like I said, thankfully we have the NYT to clear things up for us.

FWIW, I don't agree with all 10 on the list, either. Nevertheless, it's fodder for discussion, which is what we tend to do here.

That said, I can't help but notice OT getting po'ed at a few, and failing to mention the others that are legitimate... Such as, where are the studies - real studies - that show me the vaccines work?

Furthermore - and everyone from all sides of this discussion keep throwing this propaganda around - the 30k a year death from flu figure is hogwash. It is an extrapolation of data from the CDC a few years ago, and is not based on confirmed cases. If anyone cares to look into it, the worldís #1 researcher of flu and flu like viruses backs the lower numbers. It can be said that around 30k die each year in the US from "flu-like symptoms", yet when actual tests are done, it's more like a factor of 10 lower - ie 3k, not 30k.

OT, I find it interesting that you lecture us on the herd immunity theory, yet you yourself donít do your part to protect the herd.

quote:Originally posted by kenmeer livermaile: New tech can create new moral situations.

For example, when vaccines are made that can prevent a reliably estimated x # of lives, and that # is sufficiently large to concern the general populace, then not taking that vaccine becomes viewed by a great many people as a form of murder.

The underlying effect of new tech is to allow ever grater #s of people to live. The more people there are, the less personal liberty we have.

But 'meer, you didn't need million people cities to have that point of view. In Carthage, as the Romans attacked, if you didn't turn over your babies to be sacrificed by the Molochist priests, to win the favor of various fiery gods, you were considered to be a murderer and a traitor.

And the science behind the molochist priests was not *that* much more conclusive than the science behind certain vaccines today.
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quote:OT, I find it interesting that you lecture us on the herd immunity theory, yet you yourself donít do your part to protect the herd.

Herd immunity doesn't kick in until vaccination rates are something like 80-90%. We won't have herd immunity for flu unless it goes on heavily encouraged schedule (i.e. mandatory or difficult to opt out of) like childhood vaccines.

That's assuming herd immunity can be achieved with flu vaccines. While many childhood vaccines are close to 100% effective, I don't think that's the case for the flu vaccine, so even a very high vaccine rate may not instill herd immunity.
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posted October 20, 200908:36 AM
"...vaccines are close to 100% effective"

People not getting sick doesn't prove vaccine efficacy. They can be related, but, without a controlled study you cannot know if the vaccine worked, the person's immune system worked on its own, or they simply were not exposed to the disease.

That's akin to the "50% plus success rate" some people claim for the flu vaccine. Without proper studies, it cannot be proven so itís an assumption thatís been repeated often enough people think it is backed by hard evidence; itís not.
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Whether this is true is beside the point. The comment to which I responded suggested hypocrisy in OT's choice to not contribute to herd immunity. Knowing that she believes the predominant scientific view on the nature of herd immunity, vaccine rates, and efficacy, I pointed out that she would recognize no feasible potential for herd immunity for influenza and therefore there is no hypocrisy in her action.
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* The new swine influenza is mild for most people even though a small number have developed complications and died.

* The swine flu vaccine has been tested for only a few weeks on a few thousand healthy children and adults, including very few pregnant women. We don't know how safe it really is for pregnant women or children and adults with chronic illness even though they are being specially targeted for vaccination by government health officials.

* There is very little information about how safe it is to give swine flu vaccine with other vaccines, including seasonal influenza vaccine.

* There is very little information about whether the swine flu shot will keep you from getting swine flu.

posted October 20, 200911:34 AM
The H1N1 vaccine is identical to the thoroughly tested seasonal flu vaccine with the single exception of the strain of flu virus/protein that it contains. The types and quantities of all other components are identical. At the time that it became publicly available there had been "only a few weeks of testing on a few thousand healthy individuals" but at this point several more weeks have passed and many million doses have been administered. There is, of course, ongoing monitoring.
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- The number of people that have died is extremely out of proportion for other flu outbreaks at similar times. The absolute number is low, because our awarness and tracking starting off season- during a time of year when the flu is usually not on the radar at all.

-The vaccine is the same basic vaccine that has tested for years, so there are stacks and stacks of records on its overall safety and utility.

-Simlarly it has been standard practive for years to mix vaccines for three expected prominent strains together in the normal shot, so we know that there are little, if any additional risks in giving them together.

-See second point. The vaccine is the same as what's used for the regular flu shot, just using the H1N1 protien. All the same data apply, in the same way that it does when they make the normal yearly strain changes based on regular statistical modeling.

The only really special here is that we manually identified the unexpected strain in time to do something about it this year, rather than simply trusting the statistical indications for the normal set of strains.
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quote:The new swine influenza is mild for most people even though a small number have developed complications and died.

Over 40 children in the US have died from H1N1 since August 30 - the number that typically die during an entire flu season. My son could have very well been one of them if I hadn't been up to find him struggling to breath the other evening.

posted October 20, 200902:28 PM
We're all well now, including my son. There have been some cold-like symptoms in other family members but nothing as severe as what he went through so I can't say if anyone else got h1n1. Thanks for asking!
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quote:OT, I find it interesting that you lecture us on the herd immunity theory, yet you yourself donít do your part to protect the herd.

Well, in point of fact, I'm getting the seasonal mist on Thursday, when it is brought to me, because I AM indicated for that vaccine this year. H1N1 is still on restricted supply so I can't have it yet, but I assume that they will bring that to us too, when & if it's appropriate.

Matt already discussed the herd immunity issue as pertains to influenza. There are a number of reasons why herd immunity isn't a big player, and those reasons are part of why the vaccine isn't routinely recommended for everyone. I don't, in fact, think that declining the flu vaccine is ethically unsound.But the way each different disease and each different vaccine works is a little different, and far too often (especially recently) I see people making these arguments about flu vaccines that are both on the face ridiculous and then are inappropriately extrapolated to vaccines for other diseases.

I know this is going to blow your mind, Colin, but for most common childhood vaccines, as well as other diseases that used to be endemic (if not all - the only reason I don't say "all" is that I have not personally made a review of all diseases), there are controlled studies that show very clearly how effective the vaccines are at preventing disease.If I remember correctly, for instance, the measles vaccine is 80% effective on the first vaccination; that is why a booster is usually required. Herd immunity for measles requires that the vaccine be effective in I think 90 or 95% of the population, so the vaccine has to be given more than once to everyone who can have it without known danger in order to reach the critical threshold.

You know, I feel a little bad that I don't have more time to talk about this in more and better-explained depth. But I comfort myself with the (perhaps bitter) reflection that it probably wouldn't matter anyways, since the amount of misinformation on the internet far exceeds the outer limits of my ability to explain things.

eta:incidentally,

quote:The swine flu vaccine has been tested for only a few weeks on a few thousand healthy children and adults, including very few pregnant women. We don't know how safe it really is for pregnant women or children and adults with chronic illness even though they are being specially targeted for vaccination by government health officials.

You know, this is a valid concern, but one that's really unaddressable. Completely.We don't do tests on pregnant women. We just don't. Can't, really, as well as wouldn't if we could.

But we can observe that the effects of a disease are very disproportionately bad in pregnant women (children, the chronically ill), and hypothesize (based on relevant knowledge that we have) that the effects of the vaccine will be less bad. This is, obviously, less comforting than if we had data from controlled studies about the effects of vaccination on pregnant women; but we don't DO those kinds of studies ("Okay, YOU sixty women get this vaccine, and YOU sixty women get a placebo shot, and then we expose you all to the influenza and see who dies!") anymore, thank God.